lørdag 25. august 2012

Yellow legged gull in Fredrikstad 21st of august

This 1cy yellow legged gull was found while trying to relocate the caspian gull seen the day before. The search for the caspian was negative, but this bird more than compensated for it. It is a fairly typical individual. Unfortunately, the bird was quite distant and only visible through a large industrial building. These pictures are actually taken through openings in the building as can be seen in some of them. All are heavily cropped. Click on photos for larger versions (for some reason some of them have wrong width to height ratios here, but original photos appear when you click on them...)

Neat, compact build with very typical squarish head shape. Underside of the body mostly white with coarse markings on breast and flanks. Strong and long pale pink legs.

Aerodynamic shape also apparent in flight. Reduced primary window compared to herring even though some of the photographs are very badly exposed making it look like there are different birds on virtually all photos...Note mostly white belly and vent and coarsely marked breast band and flanks. Under wing on this individual lighter than on most herring gulls.